This invention relates to wireless digital communication systems, and in particular to inter network or wide area network communication protocols.
As various network protocols, such as the Internet Protocol (IP) routing scheme, proliferate for backbone digital communications, it is desirable to provide communication which is transparent to source and to destination. This means that the multilayer protocols must be substantially independent at each layer and not intervene with other layers except when it is timely to process encapsulated information. Two outstanding problems are support of a wired backbone and routing. A need in the present environment of a wired backbone is to use Wired Access Points (WAP) to allow nationwide connectivity of wireless (radio) and/or roaming nodes which use packet communication techniques. Flexibility is needed to solve routing problems. A possible design can be based on loose source routing.
Source routing is packet routing in which the source or origin of a packet specifies the link path to a destination. Source routing has been in use for example in the Internet Protocol environment, as well as in the Token Ring environment. In "strict" source routing, every intermediate node is explicitly specified from the source. In "loose" source routing, intermediate nodes are specified as a set without stating precise routing through the set for so-called "normal" routing.
What is needed is a scheme permitting loose source routing of packets between a source and an intended destination across disparate network types.